The Power of Pauper: Common Foundations
Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another edition of The Power of Pauper! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we're going to taking a look at Foundations, a new "core" set to Standard and other formats, and what implications this set may have on Pauper. In addition we've got Challenge data from this past week.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
Foundations for Pauper
A new set is upon us once more, this one being Foundations! This set is a huge Standard legal primary set that is supposed to be legal in Standard for a long time, but because we've got new cards and also reprints, there's going to be things for Pauper as well. In addition, there's also a Foundations Jumpstart product that is not primarily Standard-legal but has commons in it, so therefore possibly new cards and reprints.
Let's take a look and see what new cards we have in store.
Ambush Wolf
Kind of an interesting effect to see in Green. Giving a creature a way from interacting with one card in a graveyard is sort of different, but neat at the same time. I don't know if this one will show up anywhere, because there's plenty of graveyard hate in colorless colors, but having a 4/2 with flash stapled to this effect is versatile and different.
Elfsworn Giant
I think Elves probably has a bit better to do than this, but playing lands and accruing a board state out of it is quite interesting overall.
Fleeting Flight
While it's obviously a combat trick, the fact that this does do the Fog thing with the creature is sort of neat. Too bad it doesn't give like, a flying counter or something like that.
Go Forth
A pump spell or a spell that puts a land in hand is weirdly not super thrilling to me, but it's a card that exists. If maybe it put the land into play tapped... but then Rampant Growth would be out of a job!
Hare Apparent
Clearly someone needs to make a deck with this one.
Refute
In a format where Counterspell is legal, is Cancel+ okay? Probably not.
Scholar of Combustion
This is neat. I like it. Getting a 3/2 stapled to a spell the next turn is kind of cool.
REPRINTS
As always with these kinds of sets we do see some reprints, and some with fancy borders. Here's a few reasonably interesting reprints from this set. It does not appear that there any downshifts in this set at all.
Pauper Challenge 32 11/8
The first Challenge event of the week was the Friday event. This event had 47 players according to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Izzet Terror | 1st | carrot_eater |
| Grixis Affinity | 2nd | Mogged |
| Dimir Faeries | 3rd | Beicodegeia |
| Burn | 4th | wcl |
| Jund Broodscale Combo | 5th | PedraStone |
| Elves | 6th | Regis_Hangar49 |
| Dimir Faeries | 7th | Jose Guillermo |
| Burn | 8th | Cabezadebolo |
Pretty even spread of decks here actually. At the end of the event it was Izzet Terror that won.
This is a really powerful looking list here. I really like the Izzet variants of this deck, because I dig getting to play cards like Skred and Lightning Bolt alongside Counterspell. This deck does a great job of managing the board while putting down some powerful threats, and I think the removal is just much better in this deck than other versions of Terror.
In Second Place we had Grixis Affinity.
Very straightforward list here. I think the Grixis lists have very much convalesced to a solid looking stock list, and there's not a huge amount of needing to have cute frills. Refurbished Familiar has proven to be a solid creature long term in these lists, and I think that we will certainly see that card continue to be good in Pauper, as I don't believe it will ever reach a position where it needs to be banned.
Also in this Top 8 we had Elves.
The one thing that sticks out to me here is the four copies of Magnify in the sideboard. That's one heck of a way to beat Breath Weapon or Drown in Sorrow!
Pauper Challenge 32 11/9
The second Challenge event of the week was the Saturday event. This event had 32 players according to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Burn | 1st | Luiz0211 |
| Burn | 2nd | PedraStone |
| Dimir Faeries | 3rd | Beicodegeia |
| Burn | 4th | klien7 |
| Golgari Broodscale Combo | 5th | seasonofmists |
| Izzet Terror | 6th | Foresterf |
| Burn | 7th | wcl |
| Grixis Affinity | 8th | LuffyDoChapeuDePalha |
Lot of Burn in this Top 8, and the finals was a Burn v Burn matchup. Let's look at the winner.
Interesting to see Wrenn's Resolve since that card hasn't had a ton of play lately. Fairly light on creatures here, but they have a lot of ways to find them and a lot of burn.
Let's look at the Second Place list.
A bit more stock than the First Place list for sure. Reckless Abandon however is super cool and a really fun way of driving home extra damage, especially if you're sacrificing Clockwork Percussionist for the extra value on top of that.
Also in this Top 8 we had Dimir Faeries.
Wither and Bloom is a really neat card. A -3/-3 effect that then is able to be turned late game into a +1/+1 counter for a threat is really versatile for sure.
Pauper Challenge 32 11/10
The final Challenge event of the week was the Sunday event. This event had 58 players according to the MTGO website.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here. The Top 8 is below.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Azorius Gates | 1st | Gn42 |
| Jund Broodscale Combo | 2nd | _Batutinha_ |
| Golgari Broodscale Combo | 3rd | seasonfomists |
| Jeskai Ephemerate | 4th | PieGonti |
| Jund Broodscale Combo | 5th | DB_Sodeq |
| Burn | 6th | nv_goblin |
| Jund | 7th | iamkrazy1 |
| Mono Blue Faeries | 8th | NMT_Sco94 |
While there's a lot of Broodscale here, the rest of the Top 8 is pretty varied. At the end of the event it was Azorius Gates that won.
This is a pretty nice looking list. Outlaw Medic is a strong option here, and I still think Thraben Charm has to be one of the better white cards printed out of a Horizons set in a while.
In Second Place we had Jund Broodscale Combo.
This is mainly Golgari with the red splash for Chrysalis it seems, but Chrysalis is such a powerful card that it honestly makes sense here. Nadier's Nightblade is a super slick way of winning the game once you get the combo into play as well.
Further down the Top 8 we had Jund? Jund Affinity?
Oh huh, yeah there is a bit of an Affinity vibe here. Wow this deck is sick. It's got a lot going on here, from Chrysalis to Refurbished Familiar but it also has the sweet Cleansing Wildfire interaction with Bridges. Just a really interesting deck overall.
Around the Web
- kalikaiz has a video on BGr Glee. Check it out here.
- David Royale has a video on Boros Energy in Pauper. Check it out here.
- Apa has a trophy video on Selesnya Gates. Check it out here.
- Pauperganda has a video on UB Sushi. Check it out here.
- Our good friend Alex Ullman has a recap of this past weekend's events. Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
As League results are now spread out across the week, let's dig in and find something spicy!
Speaking of Selesnya Gates...
Wrapping Up
That's all the time we have this week folks! Thanks for supporting the column and joining us next week as we continue our journey into Pauper!
As always you can reach me at all my associated links via my Link Tree! In addition I'm always around the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the MTGPauper Discord Server.
Until next time!
